The Hole Thing: Donut County

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“A whimsical physics toy that gives players control of a mysterious hole that gets bigger each time they swallow something” sure sounds like something I’d like to play with.

Our John gushed over Kachina when he saw it at 2013’s GDC Experimental Gameplay Workshop, but too often games turn up there then vanish. This lives! Creator Ben Esposito (level designer on The Unfinished Swan and member of those wonderful Arcane Kids) this week announced that it’s become Donut County and shared a new trailer of that hole doing its swallowing thing.

Donut County’s also the name of the donut shop where the teenage protagonist works. Mysterious raccoons give her a box of the sugary snacks, which start opening holes nearby as she eats them, sez Venus Patrol. Moving the holes around, players swallow anything that fits and grow the hole bigger to swallow bigger things. They’re fairly playful for mountain-swallowing voids, as you might find e.g. swallowing water fills the hole that objects float in and a bird might drink up.

No word yet on when it’ll be released, but do enjoy this new trailer for now:

[Full disclosure: Arcane Kids had a DJ set at a party I helped organise. The plastic sun visor/sunglasses combo we brought home from San Francisco because it was the worst thing we’d ever seen might be Esposito’s. We’re pretty sure it belonged to one of the Arcane Kids.]

The Wonderful End Of The World is basically the worst introduction to the Katamari genre someone could ever get. I played that game to completion for the Valve Potato Sack ARG and it is one of the worst games I’ve ever played. The collision detection is off by miles, the characters movements are excruciatingly slow, and the music is horrible. Not to mention that the graphics are far too oversimplified for their own good and that the level design is just… bad.